No apology to Jews for racism... but praise for anti-Semitic poet
Jeremy Corbyn was condemned last night after he used his conference speech to praise an anti- Semitic poet and an activist who compared a top Israeli politician to Hitler.
After a week dominated by rows over anti-Semitism in the party, the Labour leader declined to use the opportunity to apologise for the hurt it had caused the Jewish community.
Instead he hit out at ‘ Tory hypocrisy’ and spoke about his plans to recognise unilaterally a Palestinian state if he enters No.10. He also quoted the 19th century poet and Chartist protest leader ernest Jones, whose biographer describes him as anti-Semitic.
And he praised his late Israeli friend Uri Avnery, who wrote an article which accused politician moshe ya’alon of peddling an ‘anthem of fascism’ and compared him to Adolf Hitler. Last night Conservative mP Andrew Percy said: ‘ you couldn’t make it up.
‘As long as Jeremy Corbyn is a leader, it seems anti- Jewish racism will be given a free pass in the Labour Party.’
The row came a day after Labour deputy leader Tom Watson said a failure to tackle the anti-Semitism crisis risks ‘eternal shame’ for the party.
Speaking at the Labour Friends of Israel reception on Tuesday night, he condemned party members who make ‘grotesque parallels between the Jewish state and the Nazis’ and those who call for boycotts of Israeli goods.
Susan Pollack, an 88-yearold Holocaust survivor who lost 50 relatives in the Nazi genocide, called on mr Corbyn to say ‘unfounded’ attacks on Israel are ‘not acceptable’.
In his speech, mr Corbyn read out a verse by ernest Jones, who campaigned for the vote for all working men as a leader of the Chartists.
But, according to mr Jones’s biographer Simon rennie, he was a ‘racist bigot’.
He wrote: ‘even if the conversations of romanticism required Jones to blur fact and fiction, he still emerges at times as duplicitous and unpleasant – in short, a liar, a cheat, an anti-Semite, a racist bigot, an absent father, and a neglectful husband.’
Later, mr Corbyn devoted a long part of his speech to ‘the Palestinian tragedy’.
He said: ‘As my great Israeli friend Uri Avnery who died this year put it, “What is the alternative to peace? A catastrophe for both peoples”.
But it emerged last night that in an article in 2009, mr Avnery had criticised former chief of staff of the Israeli defence forces, moshe ya’alon, for promoting views similar to the ‘knife in the back’ theory expounded by Adolf Hitler. He said: ‘The “knife in the back” legend was a stepping stone to power for Adolf Hitler. The German army stood up to the enemy and had victory in its sights, when “the politicians”, the Jews, socialists and the other “November criminals” stuck a knife in the back of the heroic fighters.’
He accused mr ya’alon of depicting political opponents as a ‘virus’ just as the Nazis had portrayed the Jews as rats spreading disease.
mr Avnery also wrote a piece called ‘The fallacy of rising anti-Semitism’.
The Labour leader mentioned the anti-Semitism criin sis in his speech but declined to apologise. He told supporters: ‘Being anti-racist means we must listen to those communities suffering discrimination and abuse. I believe we are all stronger from listening and learning from each other.
‘The Jewish people have suffered a long and terrible history of persecution and genocide. I was humbled to see a memorial to that suffering two years ago, when I visited the former Nazi concentration camp at Terezin.
‘The row over anti-Semitism has caused immense hurt and anxiety in the Jewish community and great dismay the Labour Party. But I hope we can work together to draw a line under it. I say this to all in the Jewish community – this party, this movement, will always be implacable campaigners against antiSemitism and racism in all its forms. We are your ally.
‘And the next Labour Government will guarantee whatever support necessary to ensure the security of Jewish community centres and places of worship, as we will for any other community experiencing hateful behaviour and physical attacks.
‘We will work with Jewish communities to eradicate antiSemitism, both from our party and wider society. And with your help I will fight for that with every breath I possess.’
mr Corbyn, watched by his mexican wife Laura, then went on to link the antiSemitism crisis to the Conservatives because their mePs did not vote for sanctions against Hungary’s right-wing government.
‘We won’t accept it when we’re attacked by Tory hypocrites who accuse us of antiSemitism one day, then endorse Viktor Orban’s hard-right government the next,’ he said.
‘Or when they say we are racist, while they work to create a hostile environment for all migrant communities.’
Last night euan Philipps, of Labour Against AntiSemitism, said: ‘This year the anti-Semitism is no longer on the fringes but at the core of the conference itself.’
‘Row has caused immense hurt’